


Violadorata

by serendipityxxi



Category: Legend of the Seeker
Genre: F/M, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-03
Updated: 2015-08-03
Packaged: 2018-04-12 20:37:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4493877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serendipityxxi/pseuds/serendipityxxi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Her mother had a dozen different bottles of perfume on the dresser, gifts from all over the Midlands.  Kahlan could never find the bottle that held her mother’s scent though she tried every morning. It is only one morning more than twenty years after Kahlan has lost her mother and a month after she helped save the world from the Keeper that Kahlan crests a hill and the scent comes back to her on the wind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Violadorata

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: Disclaimed.

Kahlan may not remember her mother’s favourite necklace and earrings set but she does remember Gwendolyn Amnell sitting at her dresser and taking off the jewellery at night. She remembers lying awake in her mother’s big bed in Aydindril, she and Dennee curled around each other in the early evening hours and watching her mother brush her hair at that dresser. Her mother had a lovely silver mirror and comb set that she kept on the dresser as well and Gwendolyn would lift her on her lap and brush her hair with the heavy silver backed brush until it shone. While her mother brushed her hair she’d sing - sometimes lullabyes, sometimes folk songs sometimes silly songs about the people of the Midlands and her smile when Kahlan joined in it lit up her eyes. Her clearest memory of her mother is a candle-lit reflection in the glass over her dresser, with her cheek pressed to Kahlan’s as the two finished a song about sailing away.

Her mother had a dozen different bottles of perfume on the dresser, gifts from all over the Midlands. Some evenings, if Dennee fell asleep early, she’d let Kahlan open each bottle carefully and sniff the strange and wonderful smells they held. Sometimes she’d even daub a tiny bit of the perfume behind Kahlan’s ear; it always felt cool and made Kahlan shiver. Kahlan could never find the bottle that held her mother’s scent though she tried every morning. 

It is only one morning more than twenty years after Kahlan has lost her mother and a month after she helped save the world from the Keeper that Kahlan crests a hill and the scent comes back to her on the wind. There is a small patch of bluish purple flowers carpeting the ground near the base of the hill around a sprawling oak. Kahlan follows her nose to the patch, her steps are hurried down the steep incline, much faster than her companions. 

She falls to her knees beside the blooms and bends her face to them. She shuts her eyes, inhales and she’s five years old again, seated on her mother’s knee. The morning breeze is gentle and the sun’s rays are golden and warm on her shoulders. Kahlan has been so happy for the last twenty-two days, so happy she’s felt as if she had to guard it, as if her joy would be snatched away at an instant if only the Spirits were to find out how relieved and satisfied and ecstatic she is at the gift that has been given to her in the form of Richard Cypher. She breathes in the flowers’ scent again, it’s a soft smell, fresh and light, sweet like the scent of rain can be. She can feel her mother’s hands on her cheek and feels a peace she has not felt before. 

_Love him,_ the woods seem to whisper, _it’s safe to love him now._ Kahlan feels as if her mother is smiling at her. She stays kneeling beside the bed of flowers for a long time, long enough for the others to catch up with her. She lifts her head and Cara falls silent under the weight of Kahlan’s gaze, the sarcastic words dying on her lips. The other woman realizes this is not a simple patch of posies. 

Richard crouches at her side and Kahlan turns happy eyes on him. “These were my mother’s favourite,” she tells him simply and his smile is as brilliant as the sunshine around them. 

“They’re beautiful,” he tells her gently. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen them before.” His words surprise her, her woods guide knows every plant and rock and creature by name but he doesn’t know these flowers? They must be very rare indeed.

“...quite rare,” Zedd agrees unwittingly. “These are violadoratas, they’re extremely fickle as to where they will grow and can go years without blooming,” he explains. 

“She had a perfume made with them but I could never find the bottle,” she tells Zedd when he’s finished.

“That must have been a very costly gift, they’re notoriously hard to make perfumes from as they’re resistant to magic and extremely expensive since they’re so rare. Only the most skilled perfumers even attempt it,” Zedd explains.

While Zedd talks Richard removes his hand from her shoulder and begins to root around in his pack. He comes out with a small trowel and a piece of parchment that he rolls into a cone and sticks with some beeswax. He digs gently around the base of the flowers, teasing the soil away from the roots. As he digs Cara kneels beside him and holds the cone for him to scoop some of the soil into it. Richard’s deft fingers scrabble gently in the dirt, easing one of the plants away from its fellows. He places it in the cone and packs more of its own dirt around it, tops it off with a sprinkle of water from his water skin and presents it to Kahlan with all the flourish of a bouquet. She laughs and thanks him, her eyes warm and full above the blooms. 

“When we get back to Aydindril we’ll see about replanting it and trying to make it grow,” he tells her.

Kahlan throws her arms around him, careful of the flower, with a joyful laugh. “Sometimes,” she whispers in his ear, “I think you could make anything grow.”  
She kisses him then, long and slow in front of Cara and Zedd and the whole world. She’s not afraid to love him anymore. Her mother has blessed them, and so has the Creator, nothing can touch them now. 

They walk and Kahlan dips her face back in the blooms for another whiff of her mother’s scent, listens to Zedd talk with Richard’s arm around her waist and Cara’s stoic presence at her side. She feels calm and warm and safe and loved here this morning not for what she is but who she is like she always did in front of her mother's dressing table. She hums the opening bars of the sailing away song she barely remembers and Richard surprises her by taking up the lyrics. Kahlan laughs and sings along ‘til even Cara has the tune in her steps and the woods are ringing with their song and Kahlan feels like her heart will burst.


End file.
